


Sweeter the Water

by whiteraven1606



Series: Three [5]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anxiety, Conditioning, Culture Shock, Dehumanization, Developing Relationship, Dreams and Nightmares, Dreamsharing, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Torture, Multi, Past Child Abuse, Past Torture, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-OT3, Protectiveness, Recovery, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-17
Updated: 2016-01-17
Packaged: 2018-05-14 14:10:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5747401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whiteraven1606/pseuds/whiteraven1606
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rey might say so, but Poe's is most certainly <i>not</i> collecting people from the First Order. Nope. Not at all. There's just, you know, a few...shorter ex-Stormtroopers seemingly everywhere on base that isn't a restricted area. Poe would point out that it is at least a third Finn's fault anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sweeter the Water

****

Poe moved away from the General as KN-0103 sidled towards them. He slowly approached KN-0103, who really needed a name, and crouched down to be level with her. "Everything okay? You get them split up alright?"

She bit her lip as she nodded and then shook her head. "When will we be tortured? KN-0117 said that T-116 said that Resistance scu...uhm, people would..."

Poe shook his head and forced himself to not grab her up into a hug. "No torture. You're Resistance fighters now and we don't torture anyone." He stood up and gently herded her towards the rest. "Listen up, please. This is what we're going to do. We're staying in one group. Everyone is going to turn in their blasters to the armory, because we don't take firearms into the dining hall. Then, we're going to visit Finn and we just have everyone not in Finn's room sit in the hall. After that we'll eat and bed down for the night. Sound alright?"

He got a sea of tentative head bobs, but it'd do for now. He motioned to BB-8 to lead and held his hand out to KN-0103. "Finn said you're allowed to hold hands at your height."

She eyed his hand and then looked up at him. "Yes? We don't get docked rations, but no one holds an adult's hand."

"Well, you don't have to take my hand, but I'd like it if you did."

She eyed him the entire time it took her to reach out and slip her hand against his palm.

Poe smiled his best delighted smile at her and then turned his head to include the rest of them. "Come on."

Poe made a mental note to thank Pava for her part in clearing the hallways between the landing area and the armory. They didn't meet anyone as Poe followed BB-8, with tiny Stormtroopers following him, and the General bringing up the rear without her usual trailing set of guards.

At the armory only the droid was on-duty since it was past time for evening meal. Poe unlatched the lower half-door and swung it open so the kids would be able to see where their blasters were going.

KN-0103 tugged on Poe's hand.

"Yeah?"

She frowned. "Is the metal human-shaped being a person?"

Poe looked at the General across the sea of tiny troopers and only got a shrug. Big help she was. He looked back down at KN-0103. "Well...Bean is a droid and a lot of droids are human-like beings." Poe patted BB-8, who was watching curiously. "BB-8 is a droid too."

KN-0103 tugged on his hand again.

Poe frowned. "Is something wrong?"

She bit her lip and looked from him to Bean and back. "We...we are supposed to relinquish our blasters only to an assigned adult."

Poe glanced at Bean. "Well...Am I adult enough?"

KN-0103 pulled her hand from Poe's and turned to the rest of the troopers. They huddled together and whisper fought among themselves as Poe made faces at the General over their bent heads.

The General smiled and turned to fend off an approaching officer with some report in their hand.

Poe leaned against the wall by the door. "How's it going, Bean?"

"It is going well, Commander. Firearm operations are within tolerances."

"That's good." He crouched down as KN-0103 turned away from the others. "So?"

"We think we can relinquish our blasters to you for safekeeping without incurring loss of rations."

"No loss of rations. Promise." He held out his hand for her blaster. "What about your helmets? We could put each blaster in a helmet and stack them just inside the door here against this wall."

KN-0103 nodded. "Armor is considered a expendable item during battle and we were fired upon while leaving the last planet, so that can count, right?"

Poe ignored the huff of a laugh from the General's direction. "Totally counts." He gently took her helmet from under her arm and turned it so she could place her blaster in it. He handed it to Bean, who set it just where Poe had told KN-0103 it would go. The next child stepped forward slowly.

It seemed to Poe to take forever to get down to the last child, but as he handed KN-0107's helmet and blaster to Bean BB-8 helpfully informed him it had only taken several minutes and Finn should still be awake.

"40 miniature E-11 blasters and Stormtrooper helmets, registered as received from Commander Poe Dameron. Armaments filed. Have a nice day."

Forty of them, kriffing hell. Poe held out his hand to KN-0103 again. "Next stop Medical."

They all froze and stared at him.

Poe sometimes really felt like hitting his head against a wall. "Finn is recovering, so he's in Medical. The pilot that helped you is also there."

KN-0107 leaned in a whispered in KN-0103's ear.

With a glance back towards the General, who was still being completely unhelpful, Poe waited for the kids to let him know what was wrong.

"Will we be required to stay in Medical?"

Poe squinted at her. "Is there a reason for any of you to stay in Medical?"

"No." KN-0107 sighed. "Medical hurts and there's always screaming."

He was going to find every First Order Asshole and feed them to a trash compactor. Feet first. Poe held out a hand to KN-0103 and KN-0107 each. "No one stays in Medical after everyone has had a chance to see Finn. We're going to eat in the dining hall, which is most defiantly not Medical." He raised an eyebrow until they took his hands.

BB-8 beeped at him that every First Order Asshole needed dropped out a ship hatch halfway through the Kessel Run.

"I'm right there with you, Buddy." He squeezed the kids' hands softly as they looked between BB-8 and him. "You can learn Binary if you want. That's what BB-8 speaks."

Between the armory and Medical were cleared hallways again. Poe was starting to think Pava was just a corridor ahead shooing everyone out of their path.

Dr. Kalonia met them at the door into Medical. "You don't do things by half, Commander."

Poe grinned at her. "Can't say that I do." He leaned in closer and dropped his voice. "They're afraid of Medical."

Dr. Kalonia eyed the two he was holding hands with. "Well, at some point we need baseline scans, but it can wait." She looked at Poe with a disdainful expression. "The pilot is afraid of Medical as well. Seems like the only former-First Order person I've met not afraid of me is Finn, but then he's mostly been asleep, so what do I know?"

Poe gave her a sweet smile and a quick peek on her cheek. "Everything, I'm sure. May we see Finn?"

She rolled her eyes as she moved to one side. "Form a line. No more than five in at a time and you are all out of here in an hour. Read me?"

"Loud and clear." He'd have saluted just to watch her be exasperated at him, but his hands were full. Poe tugged on the pair gently to get them to come along with him as he headed for Finn's room.

Finn was laying on his side facing towards them with BB-8 excitedly beeping at him. "I still don't know what you're saying. The medical droid said he'd translate, but he isn't..." Finn caught sight of Poe. "Poe! BB-8's all excited about someth..." He trailed off. "Oh."

Poe pulled the pair of troopers forward until they were right up against Finn's bed. "Finn, this is KN-0103 and 07. Kids, this is Finn, formerly FN-2187." Poe smiled at Finn's stunned expression. "Finn, buddy, next time tell me I'm about to get forty Stormtroopers in a what most definitely is a very loose definition of a squad, please."

Finn looked from the kids to Poe. "You'd already said yes to her and I worried if I'd said how many you wouldn't have still tried. That's why I told her to march them from training straight past the mess to the supply staging area."

KN-0103 lit up. "And it worked. Why did it work? I kept thinking someone would stop us, but everyone just ignored us until we started to board the food shuttle and even then JY-0025 kept anyone from shooting until the last moment when he was closing the hatch." She dropped Poe's hand and moved to hang on the edge of Finn's bed.

Finn sat his hand on the bed in front of her. "If we yelled, but we were wrong to have alerted than we'd be punished. No one wants to be first so everyone waits for someone else to alert."

Poe found himself nodding. That was how it seemed to work from the way the Stormtroopers in the _Finalizer_ 's hangar had acted.

Finn looked up at Poe. "We aren't always consecutive numbers because of troops differentiated for special training. Like becoming a pilot."

"Running from rathtars didn't help any." Poe let KN-0107's hand slip from his as the boy edged closer to Finn's bed.

Finn made a face. "There was that too." He made waggled his fingers at the kids. "It's okay. Poe gave me a name and a jacket for my own to keep. He'll help us so none of us ever have to go back to the First Order."

KN-0103 cocked her head. "You're injured severely?" Her hand crept up to the edge of the bed.

Finn nodded minutely. "Dr. Kalonia doesn't want me to walk until at least tomorrow."

"Day after tomorrow!"

They all jumped.

Poe turned his head. "No yelling! You'll scare the children."

She rolled her eyes. "Do you know how many vaccination kits I'm going to have to bribe someone to send me, Dameron?"

"Forty?"

"None."

Poe frowned down at Finn. "They need their vaccines, Finn."

"Phase One troopers have all the necessary vaccinations before being allowed out of Pool."

Poe stepped back and settled on the edge of his cot that was still setting against the wall. "I feel like I'm learning a new language. Pool?"

KN-0103 brightened. "I know that one! Enlistment Pool is the big holding room and once we are big enough to walk we leave Pool for preliminary testing and are assigned a designation."

"Then we're put in Squad barracks until Phase Two when we move to the other side of base." KN-0107 poked the back of Finn's hand.

Finn held still and let the boy poke his hand a second time. "After training in Phase Two, troopers are resorted and any specializations are assigned before splitting into Phase Three training."

KN-0107 stroked his tiny fingers down the back of Finn's hand. "You _aren't_ a myth."

Finn turned his hand over and let them touch his palm. "No, I'm not a myth." He looked at Poe.

Poe stood back up from his cot and crowded the kids because he knew what that pleading look meant. He'd seen it on the General and even in the mirror once after a particularly bad recruiting assignment. "Alright, let's switch out with some more of the squad."

KN-0103 squeezed Finn's hand once, quick as a blaster shoot, before grabbing KN-0107's hand and hurrying from the room. The hallway lit up in chatter as the tiny troopers relayed that Finn really was real.

Poe leaned over and put his face in close to Finn's. "You alright for more of them? I can tell them no. At least, I think I can tell them no."

Finn grinned and lifted his head that last tiny distance to bring their foreheads together. "I'll be alright. She's alive, Poe."

Poe grinned and let his head drop enough for them to stay in contact as Finn had to let his head back down onto the bed. "Yeah, Buddy, her and the whole squad, plus one pilot. JY-0025, I take it? Think he'll want a name?"

Finn's smiled widened as they stayed in contact. "Yeah. Did the General say you have to name them? That female pilot you know seemed to think that's what was going to happen."

Poe leaned his head and planted a quick kiss on Finn's temple before pulling back as the noise in the hallway started to settle. "That'd be Jessika Pava spreading gossip. It has been strongly suggested to me that I will have a hand in naming them. Forty of them, Finn."

"Sorry about not saying anything."

Poe shrugged. "Don't be. It turned out fine." He eased to one side as a veritable stampede of tiny feet headed for them.

****

Poe was beyond exhausted by the time they turned the corner into the dining hall. Finding Pava and Snap waiting on them was about the best thing Poe had seen all day. "Hey, guys."

Pava smiled as KN-0103 waved at her. "Hi, kid." She squinted at Poe. "Squad, really?"

Poe rolled his eyes as he herded KN-0103 and KN-0107 towards the fresh trays. "Don't you start. You're getting a lot of good liquor out of it." He waved at the rest of the troopers crowding up to the trays. "Make yourselves useful."

With a shake of her head, Pava waded in and started passing trays and utensils out.

Poe picked food carefully and tried to remember how much had been put on a plate for him when he had been as short as the kids were. At the end of the line he turned and grinned as Snap helped by carrying glasses towards the tables.

Someone had rearranged the tables so they were long lines forming a big box. Poe settled the first kids at the nearest corner and then headed back to help some more with serving themselves. He tried not to let their whispered chatter to each other about food that wasn't a bar or all one color get to him as he went back and forth getting everyone settled.

Pava leaned against him as Poe watched the kids eat as near silently as little kids chewing could get. "You did good."

Poe let his head rest against the top of Pava's. "Yeah. Any idea where they're sleeping?"

The General settled against the counter near them. "The empty quarters across from your squad that we never divided up. I've got someone checking the fresher and C-3PO is hunting two more pillows to even up the numbers."

Poe sighed. "Blankets?"

"Those we have plenty of, Commander."

The kids started whisper fighting again.

Poe lifted his head and pushed off the counter. "Wonder what new horror I'm about to hear."

The General caught his elbow. "One of us can..."

"No." Poe shook his head and extracted his elbow from her hold. "I've got it." He headed over as the argument started to get more heated. "Hey, what's going on?"

They all froze for a few moments before turning towards him. 

KN-0103 frowned up at him. "T-121 always said that names were a contamination. Which leads to reeducation." She pushed the last bit of food around on her tray with her spoon. "Finn said you gave him his name for him to keep."

Poe pulled a chair over, turned it around, and straddled it. "I did. Everyone deserves a name of their own."

She frowned harder. "We can own things? For ourselves?" She scrunched up her nose. "T-116 said that ownership is dangerous and T-121 said it was infraction of the rules."

Poe bit his lip as he thought about how to explain. "In the Resistance the rules are different. Everyone owns some things for themselves and other things are common property." He pointed at the food tray. "That tray is a common property." He plucked at his shirt. "My clothing is my own, like my name is my own."

The kids whispered among themselves as KN-0103 stared at her food tray.

"Would you like a name?" Poe leaned down to catch her eye. "You don't have to have one. It isn't a requirement or anything."

She huffed and stared at him for a few more moments before kneeling up in her chair. "Can I share letters with someone else? We know our letters."

Poe dug into his pocket for his note taker. "Yeah, letters are a common property. Some people even have the same name as someone else." He opened a new note. "You write at all?"

She frowned. "Write your name down and the Princess General's name."

Poe winced slightly as the General signed that heavy sigh that meant Poe's future was going to be very unpleasant. "Sure. Anyone else's name?"

"Finn's and BB-8's name. Can you write down the mad lady's name too?"

"Jessika? Sure." Poe wrote all their full names out carefully. He added Rey's and Snap's names to the list. "These are names of people I know as well."

KN-0103 eyed the list. She stared pointing out letters. "That one and then that one..."

Poe dutifully wrote them down as she pointed until she smiled. "Kaleine, huh?"

"Mine." She beamed at him. "Good?"

Poe smiled. "Great, Kaleine. I like it." He looked around at all the little wide eyes. "Anyone else want a name?"

****

Poe stared at the gap in the roster as Pava wrote the kids' new names on name tags for them to wear in the morning. He recounted the list again and came up with forty, but there was a gap in the numbers. KN-0125 wasn't on the list. He looked around and quietly asked BB-8 to give him a count of the kids as Pava finished the last name tag.

She leaned to him over as BB-8 reported forty kids. "What is it?"

Poe tilted the note taker so she could see the gap as he pointed to it. "Maybe I miss counted the numbers?" He didn't think he'd missed any of them.

KN-0107, newly dubbed Noilo, peeked over Poe's arm to see the list. "You didn't miss anyone."

Poe eyed the boy. "Oh?"

Noilo glanced over at the squad putting their dirty trays on the belt for the cleaning droid. "He was taken for reeducation and..." Noilo looked up at Poe. "KN-0103...Sorry, Kaleine, wanted to escape because KN-0125 decommissioned himself when he came back from reeducation."

Pava swore under her breath and grabbed Poe's shoulder in a tight grip.

He put his hand over her's as he looked at Noilo. "Do you know why he was taken for reeducation?"

Noilo nodded. He took a couple of deep breaths and then blurted out in a whisper, "He made a rock float."

Poe slowly exhaled. "I need you and Kaleine to help the squad understand that we don't have reeducation like that. We're not going to hurt anyone if they happen to be able to float a rock, okay?"

The nod he got was slow and Noilo's expression was dubious, but Poe would take what he could get at this point.

With the help of Poe's remaining squad-mates and the General they got the children into the quarters and blankets passed out. Armor came off in neat piles along the walls and blankets spread on the cots lined up across the floor. 

Pillows were stared at, just as Poe had thought they might be, but once Kaleine was convinced to touch the whole squad was soon immersed in petting their own pillows.

They turned the light level down to minimal and Poe watched as the children went to sleep between one breath and the next. No begging for more time awake, no asking for stories, nothing but little bodies laid out like tiny blanket covered logs.

Poe eased his way out of their room and let the General hug him so tight he couldn't breathe in the hallway while they both cried.

****

Poe couldn't seem to bed down in his own room and he'd left BB-8 with the little former troopers. He finally gave up and headed to Medical to sack out on the cot in Finn's room. He watched Finn breathe for a while, until he felt simultaneously like a creep and more exhausted than he thought possible. He rolled to face the wall and finally felt sleep start to overtake him.

He wasn't surprised to find himself in his dream hanger. BB-8 was rolling patrol near the forcefield and Finn was eyeing a burnt out X-Wing near the blast door they'd gone out of to find Kaleine. Poe moved through the wreckage of the hanger to get to Finn.

"Hey."

Finn smiled at him. "Poe."

Poe smiled back and opened his arms to Finn. "Buddy, they are heartbreaking, but we are keeping them. I promise."

Finn hugged him and held on tight. "Thank you."

They clung to each other for what felt like forever and no time at all. Poe really hated dream time sense, yes, yes, he did. 

There was a sizzle sound from the forcefield. They parted and turned towards the noise.

Outside of the forcefield, dressed in Stormtrooper armor that was black and speckled with stars was Kaleine. She was standing on nothing, but Poe thought she was actually standing on something he couldn't perceive, not just floating without gravity. She was oriented with the hanger's directional sense.

Poe moved over to sit in front of her with the forcefield an invisible barrier between them. "Hey there."

She smiled at him and grinned even wider at Finn. "Hello."

Finn settled on the ground near Poe. "Hello."

"I have a name now. I'm Kaleine. Poe let me pick it out myself."

"It sounds like a good name." Finn looked at Poe from the corner of his eye.

"It's a great name." Poe gestured at Kaleine's armor. "What's with the black speckled look?"

She looked down at herself. "This is for hiding." She leaned sideways and looked past them to the wreckage in the hanger. "Could you pass me that broken bit there?"

It took Poe and Finn both to move the part of the X-Wing she'd pointed at, but once it passed through the forcefield Kaleine handled it easily, reshaping it between her hands into black plating with a dense star pattern of shimmering spots on it.

Poe frowned as she moved to the side of the hanger's opening and started affixing the plate to the ship's side. "What are you doing?"

She floated back over. "I'm making sure he can't see you." She pointed at a dead pilot. "Could you bring me that person?"

Poe woke up feeling rested and calm. He couldn't remember what he'd been dreaming about, but it hadn't felt like he'd been scared so it probably hadn't been about rathtars. He held still as he heard soft footsteps come into the room.

"Finn?" Her voice was nearly not there in the still of the room.

"Uhmm?"

She moved between the bed and the cot. "I like the Resistance better than the First Order."

Poe listened to Finn's blankets rustle.

"Me too, Kaleine."

Poe wondered when Finn had heard the kids' new names.

She made a soft sound in her chest. "Do you think more of us will come?"

"I don't know. Most of us would be too afraid."

BB-8 beeped softly from the foot of the cot.

"What's the droid saying, Finn?"

"I don't know. I can tell when BB-8 says Poe, but that's all I've gotten worked out so far."

BB-8 rolled closer.

"Uhm. It's tugging on my boot."

Poe rolled over and tried to locate BB-8 in the near dark. "BB-8 let her be."

BB-8 beeped indignantly at him.

"Yes, I did, but that doesn't mean you have to try to get her to sleep clear through the night, Buddy." Poe watched Kaleine stare at BB-8 as the droid complained about humans and their sleep schedules until Poe flopped over and pulled the pillow partway over his head. "We sleep when we sleep. Best I've got, Buddy."

BB-8 trilled a complaint and rolled away as Kaleine made a tiny laugh that was stifled almost before it started.

"You can laugh here."

Poe thought Finn sounded more certain of that then he had most other things. He listened to more rustling.

"Poe's been injured." She sounded like she'd climbed onto Finn's bed.

Poe settled under his pillow more comfortably. He was drifting back to sleep regardless of what was being said about him across the room.

"He was tortured by the First Order before I helped him get to a TIE fighter to get us both off the _Finalizer_."

She made a quiet noise near to a sigh and then there was more rustling. "We'll keep him safe. I don't want to lose him, Finn."

Poe tried to stay awake to hear Finn's answer, but he was sucked down into sleep.

****

Poe woke with a sense of peace he'd not really had since before his mind had been flayed open. He yawned and sat up as BB-8 told him from the end of the cot that Kaleine had slept under him on the floor for several hours before going back to the rest of her squad just before morning shift changeover.

Finn was staring at BB-8 with a determined look on his face. He caught Poe looking and grinned. "Still don't understand droid."

Poe smiled and carded his hand through his hair. "You'll get there. We'll get you an identification card done up and you can buy your own books and learning courses. BB-8 was just telling me where Kaleine slept."

"Oh." Finn blinked. "I don't have any money."

Poe grinned. "I'm pretty sure you're a big shot in the Resistance, so I'm thinking they'd give you a stipend."

Finn covered his face with his hand. "Who told you about that?"

"Chewbacca. He seemed to think you impressed Han something fierce and I was supposed to make sure you didn't die before Chewie could get back from him and Rey going to retrieve Skywalker." Poe gently pulled Finn's hand away from his face. "What I want to know is how you convinced BB-8 to tell you where the base was?"

Finn scrunched up his nose. "I pretty much just begged. Rey was asking and trying to fix a problem with the ship and I was trying to pass her parts with names I didn't know while BB-8 helped. I promised I'd get BB-8 to your base before the First Order could get here."

Poe shook his head.

They both startled as a shout came from the hallway.

"Dameron!"

Poe pulled on his boots. "The General sounds unhappy." He grabbed Finn's hand and squeezed for a moment. "I'll visit later."

"DAMERON!"

Finn pushed on Poe's closer leg. "You'd better scramble."

Poe scrambled. He skidded slightly as he rounded the hallway corner out of Medical and nearly straight into the General. "Ma'am?"

She grabbed his arm firmly and started dragging him back up the hallway. "So much trouble, Commander."

Poe huffed and let her drag him towards the dining hall. "What happened?" He eyed the door to Supply as they passed it. It looked...shiny.

"I woke to a clean base this morning."

"Okay?" Poe stared at the wall of the hallway they were going down now. It dawned on him why the wall didn't have the proper dank stain on it that had been there since the last wet season. "How'd they reach the ceiling?"

"I have not asked that." Her grip on his arm loosened slightly. "They obeyed all the hastily rendered restriction signs I had put up while we were feeding them last night."

They turned another corner and Poe turned his head to look at the corner that used to have a tree root coming through it. Someone had clipped the root flush to the wall and it was all polished to a high shine.

"Did they sleep at all? I swear we left them asleep."

"We don't know. Night patrols say they never saw them moving. Droids refuse to spill. They all say friends of the Droidsaver are friends of theirs and then they repeat the troopers didn't violate any restrictions."

"True. We didn't tell them they had to say in quarters. I know Kaleine came to Finn's room at some point. I was mostly asleep so I can't tell you just when."

The General huffed as they turned into the hallway that lead to the dining room. "They are refusing to eat until you've told them if they've finished morning chores."

"Me?" Poe's jaw popped as he yawned. "I haven't even had any caf this morning." He eyed the too shiny skylights as they walked under them. "Wait a parsec. Who's Droidsaver?"

"From what I can gather that'd be Rey."

Poe could feel his head starting to throb. "The kids haven't even met Rey."

The General raised an eyebrow at him as they stopped just outside the dining hall. "I'm thinking that doesn't matter to BB-8, Poe."

"Ah." He pulled his shirt down to smooth out any wrinkles as the General nonchalantly shoved him through the doors into the dining hall.

****

Poe felt exhausted by the time he'd gotten them all sorted and sat down with food. He waited for his cup to fill with caf as Pava came over to stand with him.

"You alright?"

"Just tired." He blinked as the cup in his hand disappeared. "Jess."

She put her cup in his hand as she fixed his cup to be extra sweet. "You do good with them." She exchanged their cups again as her's finished filling up.

Poe took a large swig as he turned to look out over the dining hall mostly filled by little troopers in their Stormtrooper blacks, spread out among the tables where someone had put them back in normal order. "They cleaned the base."

"Only part of it. I think I found the stop line over near the repair bays." She took a sip from her cup. "They're never going to be normal kids, are they?"

Poe didn't harbor any dreams on that. "No. Kid soldiers rarely get to be close to normal."

She hummed as she drank some more. "We're missing ten, you notice?"

He'd not even attempted to count yet. "Hadn't until you said."

"They're tucking food away too."

Poe mentally groaned at the prospect of attempting to convince the kids they didn't need to hoard. Or to at least hoard field rations that wouldn't spoil. He started for them, but stopped when BB-8 came rolling up. "Hey, Buddy."

BB-8 told him that the path in his room to BB-8's charging station needed unblocked.

"It should be clear." He needed to do laundry, so if he'd knocked the catch all over the clothing might be too high for BB-8 to maneuver out of the way. "I'll come fix it." Poe clapped Pava on the shoulder and headed out as BB-8 beeped happily and lead the way. He could deal with the kids' hoarding at midday meal.

When he got to his room, Poe stood in the doorway and stared. There were ten little troopers spread out across his floor. Blankets upon blankets were carefully spread out to make a soft floor and the ten were piled close together near his bunk.

BB-8 shifted back and forth next to him. Poe closed his door and knelt down to be level with BB-8's optical sensor.

"Why are they sleeping in my room?"

BB-8 trilled and turned around on the spot.

"No, I'm not saying they can't stay in my room, but we gave them a room of their own."

BB-8 rolled across the hall to the troopers' room and beeped at him.

Poe scratched the back of his neck as he followed BB-8 into the room. It looked like it hadn't seen forty little bodies, except the Stormtrooper armor and pillows were all neatly stacked along the walls. "I'm not awake enough for this. I'm going to take a shower. Would you go get me a towel and don't tell me you can't reach your charging station when you can. They left you a very clear path."

With a shrill set of beeps BB-8 headed back towards the door.

"Don't think I didn't see where they'd moved my secondary boots out of your way, Buddy."

****

Poe spent most of his day calming people down. From droids upset the kids were attempting to do the droids' jobs, to himself over the kids sleeping in his room in shifts, to base personnel that were weirded out by miniature Stormtroopers, even if they were just in the black under-armor layer, all over the unrestricted parts of the base.

It didn't help that the squad had split itself up and were seemingly following Poe, BB-8, Pava, and the General any time they weren't in areas deemed off limits for the small troopers.

Poe flopped down in the chair next to the former TIE pilot as his trailing trooper disappeared in the direction of Finn's room. "Let's hope your day has been less hectic than mine."

The pilot eyed him. "You know, I was given a medicine just to ease my pain."

"Yeah? That's a thing that happens."

With a smile the pilot shook his head. "No, no, it isn't. Or at least it wasn't in the First Order." He shifted himself up a little in the bed. "Trusting a former enemy should be harder than I'm finding it."

"Nah. It's easy to trust the people that don't kill you just for getting injured."

"They would have recycled me."

"That is not as reassuring as you seem to think it is supposed to be." Poe leaned forward. "Do you have any idea why the kids are sleeping in shifts?"

"Standard procedure for off-base operations. Shifts for sleeping and patrols."

"Any idea why they are only sleeping in my room?"

"Are they following you around?"

Poe frowned. "Yes. They're following a few other people too."

"People you favor or they've seen you've interact with?"

"Yes and yes."

The pilot smiled as he turned his head to look at Poe. "They've decided you're their superior officer. They're making sure you are protected. They will guard your possessions, you, and any officer you have shown respect towards."

Poe scrubbed his face with the palms of his hands. "Why me?"

"I hear you named them."

Poe eyed the pilot through his fingers, because that had sounded pretty wistful. "Have you picked a name yet?"

The pilot shrugged and wrapped his arm around his healing ribs. "No. Decisions are more daunting than I thought they'd be."

"You'll get used to it." Poe pulled out his note taker. "We can name you like Kaleine named herself."

It didn't take them long to decide on letters, but arranging them into a pattern that was pleasing, but pronounceable took longer. They finally decided on Jaydavi. Poe smiled as he wrote it out on a name tag.

"There. Now everyone will know you've got a name." Poe patted Jaydavi on the shoulder as he put the name tag on the table next to the bed. "What happens to defectors if the First Order catches them?"

Jaydavi squinted at him and adjusted how he was laying in the bed before frowning. "They'd have you believe there aren't any. They are always called traitors as they are killed, but given how bad they look by the time they are executed...Very bad things happen to them."

"And you helped the squad anyway."

Jaydavi nodded. "It was...good to believe that FN-2187 had gotten away. It was even better to know that I might get beings so little out of the First Order's reach." He looked at Poe and then down at a scar on the back of his own hand. "Flying TIE's made it so tempting to run. Just take off without permission and _go_." He grinned at Poe. "I'd never seen it done until you and FN-2...No, Finn, did it. Or, mostly did it. You did get shot down."

Poe grinned. "We did manage to blow up one of the ship's ventral cannons on the way."

"Oh, yeah, they were pissed about that. Captain Phasma yelled and railed so much three of my squad didn't want to go in and land. We ended up doing two sweeps of Jakku before finally going back in."

"You didn't see the crash? Finn told Rey that the smoke plume from the crash hung in the air for a while even after the TIE itself was sucked under the sand."

"Smoke isn't enough evidence and I wasn't certain the chute I thought I saw was a chute."

"So, of course, you didn't alert."

Jaydavi shrugged. "I'm pretty sure one of the others saw it too, but they didn't say anything, so neither did I."

Poe nodded as he stood up. "Thank you." He laid his hand on Jaydavi's closer leg. "If you decide to fly for us I expect you to tell me when you see something. We don't punish people for mistakes."

Jaydavi huffed and settled deeper under his blanket. "The Resistance is very odd."

Poe waved as he headed for the door. "You'll get used to it."

****

Poe headed to his room that evening to go to bed, but when he opened his door it looked like there'd never been any tiny ex-troopers sacked out on his floor. The only evidence they'd been in his room was neatly folded clothing on the couch and his secondary boots neatly shined at the foot of his bed. Poe put his clothes into their drawers and took a shower before heading to Medical.

He bedded down on the cot in Finn's room and watched Finn sleep for a while before drifting off himself.

The dreamscape hanger had a cleared landing site from D'Qar and the Force-sensitive tree from his childhood home on Yavin 4 was growing near the back with Finn curled at the base, sleeping. Poe turned towards the hanger's opening and BB-8 was rolling patrol near the forcefield. Out in the void of space along the line the hanger's floor made were little _bumps_ in space.

Poe drifted closer to the forcefield and looked them over. He could barely discern them from the surrounding space. One of them shifted and from it flowed Kaleine in her dark speckled Stormtrooper armor. She looked at him and smiled.

He smiled back and beckoned to her.

Kaleine floated close to the forcefield. "You look better...Poe." She frowned. "Should we call you Poe? I hear others call you Commander, but the mad woman calls you Poe."

"Poe is fine." He sat down on the ground of his hanger and gently traced the forcefield between them. "You camouflaged everyone?" He pointed at the bumps out in space.

She turned her head to look. "He can still find us, but it is much harder this way."

Poe hummed and squinted as out far past the bumps there was a flare. "Uh."

Kaleine stared at it with him as the flare dissolved into Rey walking on her Jakku sand towards them. "Who is she?"

"That's Rey. She's Finn's friend." He watched her pause and think for a time before reorienting on him and starting towards them more squarely. "You don't have to hide us from her."

Kaleine made a small noise. "It's dangerous to be seen."

Poe stood and waved at Rey. "Everything has a degree of danger, Kaleine."

Rey stopped at the edge of the bumps. "Poe?"

He cupped his hands to project his voice towards her. "We're fine. Found a squad of Stormtrooper kids that wanted to live with Finn."

She carefully picked her way in to them and looked down at Kaleine. "Hello."

"Hello." Kaleine looked over Rey's sand. "You should make the sand match space. It's harder to see from a distance."

Rey nodded as she looked at Poe. "Makes sense. I'm Rey."

Poe waved a hand at Kaleine. "This is Kaleine. She brought her whole squad and a TIE pilot to the Resistance."

Rey snorted. "You're collecting ex-Stormtroopers now, Poe?"

Poe rolled his eyes. "They aren't mine. I'm just..." He made a face. "Naming them? It isn't like I'm planning on the Stormtroopers revolting or anything. She wanted to escape, so Finn and I helped."

Rey looked past them to Finn sleeping under the new tree in Poe's hanger. "He has help now." She smiled down at Kaleine. "You are helping Finn protect Poe, aren't you?"

Kaleine nodded. "He's been injured, but the Resistance didn't decommission him."

Poe made a helpless sort of expression as Rey looked sharply up at him. "We've been working on trust issues."

"I bet." Rey turned her head as out in space there was a huge explosion of light. "Oh, that's why the General thought it was dangerous."

Kaleine made an scared noise deep in her chest and dove for the cover of Poe's ship's armor plating that she'd made for him.

Poe felt the forcefield change and BB-8's shrill alert tones sounded as the droid rolled to the nearest control panel.

Rey's sand faded to blend with Poe's ship as the huge flare of light seemed to be looking for something.

It was huge and blue-white as it floated around near were it had started.

Rey bit her lip. "I didn't warn him and I think he's...worried."

Poe watched the light circle wider from where it had appeared. "If it is him, you need to get him less bright before the bad guys notice a difference."

Nodding, Rey put her hand his forcefield. "We're going to be heading back. Chewie says it should take a week since we don't have to meander along with a map."

Poe nodded. "We're going to start packing base tomorrow. We found a new position for a base." He mirrored her hand with his own. "Be careful. Come home to us."

Rey smiled at him. "Have fun with your collecting." She sprinted away, her Jakku sand dark beneath her feet as she went.

Poe couldn't resist yelling after her. "I'm not collecting them!"

The mass of light turned a feeling of attention their direction as Rey's sand faded back into being the proper color for Jakku as she neared the light.

Poe snapped awake with the feeling of one of his hands trapped by something. He tugged a little on his hand as he tried to wake up properly. He rolled and squinted in the low light at where his hand was tra...Oh, not trapped, just being held onto by Kaleine where she was sleeping on the floor.

Poe rubbed an eye as he leaned over to pull her up onto the cot with him. He managed to get her blanket up there with them. He laid back and evened out his breathing.

It wasn't long before she sat up and extracted herself from him with an agility that impressed him. She took her blanket with her as she slipped away.

Despite feeling like he needed to go after her and explain she could sleep in a cot, Poe smiled at the thought that Rey was coming back. They could argue about his very much not-collecting people habits when she got here.

****


End file.
